Through the New Blogger Initiative that Syp has been coordinating, I ran across a new blog I find quite enjoyable. It's witty and funny and I like the way the screenshots turn out so I thought I'd point people in its direction. So head on over to Hipsalotro!

Turbine finally released the spring festival, so I decided to have a look at the new horse, see if the last maps for the Cartographile deed were there and see if there are any new cosmetics. I was pleasantly surprised by the cosmetics! I've been on a Lotro hiatus due to dissatisfaction with aspects of the game, but this will be enough to draw me back for a bit. :)

They've come out with a Simbelmynë theme, which is appropriate as we head towards Rohan. I'm a bit ambivalent about the horse but am pleased to see a proper saddle back. The detailing is also quite nice. Luckily I had some leftover leaf tokens so was able to buy the dress right away:

They also made a new flower circlet which I like quite a bit more than the old one. I had to use Lotro's standard dressing room to get a screenshot so the quality isn't very good. (I really ought to stop being lazy and get a plug in for a larger dressing room window!) Though taking screenies of cosmetics always makes me want a better computer and a bigger monitor as others out there get some really sharp pictures ingame. :P There's also a matching tunic, cloak and floppy sun hat plus last year's spring cosmetics.

The final maps are there, so the Eriador Cartographile deed will finally come to an end, yay. i've yet to check out any of the quests and see if there is anything new. The shrew stomping has returned as well and I shall be spending a fair bit of time there, finishing out my deed. There do not appear to be any new consumables thankfully so none of those to grind out!

Anytime a Loremaster uses Light of the Rising Dawn or Cracked earth, the character disappears. You can also see another bug in the 2nd picture. Something has gone wrong with all legendary weapons across all classes. Firstly when you're running, it bounces all over your back and even more spectacularly the LI glow doesn't sync with the weapon. Characters don't even hold their weapons properly anymore either. I had to laugh when I first saw it because it's so bad.

Stealth characters now appear to have super stealth as well. I heard players reporting that they could barely see their wargs, that basically they'd turned into floating names. So I checked out my burg and it was affected too:

I'm really quite astonished at the amount of things Turbine broke and are now being classified bugs:

-Invisible LMs during two frequently used skills

-increased opacity on stealthed characters so that they nearly go invisible

-LI weapon placement and corresponding glow unsynced with the characters

-Champion Swift Strike taking on the combat animation and speed of Blade Wall, rendering it neither swift or a strike.

-Release star-lit crystals knowing they do not work on champion runes or burglar tools. Also said crystals drastically increase stats on 3rd/2nd agers (to the point that 2nd agers are nearly as good as 1st agers) yet 1st agers do not enjoy the same increases when crystals are applied. Crystals are also not rare, so unless your group remembers to change the loot rule, the first person who opens the chest acquires the crystal. If that member isn't honest or kind enough to let everyone roll, well, you're screwed.

Oh you you rolled need on that because you needed it to sell it on the AH?

I'm sure I've missed bugs. All the old ones are still there as well. They've also made more changes that water down the game but more on that in another entry I think. But seriously, I cannot fathom how these things came to be messed up... things that were fine before this update. It seems like Turbine has this need to mess with stuff that isn't broken and in the meantime, break it, all the while there's real stuff that needs fixing. Yes we got a new skirmish (though my boyfriend and I tried it on t2 and it was facerollingly easy. Granted we're geared about as good as you can get on a LM, but still...), the new maps are very pretty, but overall this was a fail of an update. I don't understand how they couldn't catch this stuff, why they don't test more, why they need to rush out buggy material. A kinnie said in game that he doesn't play the game for its graphics, but for the people. Sure, but when a company can't professionally release a working product, that will drive people away. Diablo III was just released, GW2 and Secret World are coming out soon. I understand the need to keep up and give players new things to do, but releasing it in a bugged state and breaking things that were previously fine isn't going to keep people around and will only further damage their confidence in Turbine. [/rant]

After a fair few nights, lining up for a lot of tries at Shadow Challenge Mode,

many times purposefully wiping in order to preserve the challenge,

Innocent finally prevailed and conquered the challenge mode with a few seconds to spare!

For the first time I actually remembered to get a screenshot of the deed completion popping up on my screen. :P We don't have a video unfortunately due to our camera man not raiding with us that night. It was such a relief to finally get this done. I was starting to feel like we were banging our heads on the wall. It's quite the stressful fight for an LM as well. Also your pet won't stay on the boss even when you take it off assist. It makes me feel dumb when I notice my bear is sat in the middle of the room doing nothing! The last thing I want to be paying attention to is if my pet is attacking the boss or not! Anyway, Innocent is now 3/5 for the challenge modes, which is basically all that is possible until Turbine fixes the Fire and Frost and Saruman fights.

I also received my 3rd(!) first ager. It's sorta weird to have what feels like so many to me as never before have I been lucky enough to receive a 1st age token while it's still currently the best in the game. I decided to make my rk a new fire stone. I lucked out with my legacies, but the base stats were a fair bit of a let down. I don't get why the devs do this. You can see the difference between my new stone and my 2nd ager. It's going to be hard to give those passives up, but on the whole, the 1st ager is definitely better. But seriously: what rk wants agility or parry rating? or how about might on an LM staff? Why even bother having these useless things ingame, especially when it deflates players a bit after the elation of getting a new weapon? Ah well, I'm certainly enjoying the higher dps and menacing tanks even more. ;)

This is Tristadoc, my new hobbit burglar. He's a nice guy, always willing to lend a hand whether it be deliveries:

or getting down to business and banishing some bad guys!:

Yet he also knows how to have some fun!

I've been having quite a lot of fun playing him. At first I did have a female human burglar. It would have been an elf one if I could have made one as I've been too stuck on them. I only strayed from the female elf character when I was forced to, ie captain. I of course identify with females so I've generally found them more enjoyable to play. I do have a female hobbit minstrel, which really put me off hobbits. All the screaming, the way they run, what is to me silly combat sounds and it being one of the more implausible race/gender combinations to be running around, adventuring in Middle Earth, made it tiresome to play. I doubt I would have made it to the former level cap if I hadn't been leveling with someone. It just wasn't for me, which is unfortunate as my minstrel is decently geared for 65 and the class I felt slightly more comfortable healing on (RK is a bit scary for me when the whole group is taking damage.)

I call this his "I'm sexy and I know it" look.

Luckily my boyfriend convinced me to give a hobbit burglar a try, since when you think about it, there really aren't many good human thief characters in stories. Also Bilbo is what inspired the class, so a hobbit makes the most sense. I rolled one as a test on another server to make sure I could deal with the combat sounds (which I adore on a male hobbit!.. well, non-warden ones :P) before I deleted my current human one and found that a male hobbit is quite entertaining. The side effect of finally trying out a male character, plus my RK duoing with my boyfriend's male guardian, has been to make me want to reroll my female guardian. But she's a Westfold Master of the Guild Metalsmith. No way in hell I'm redoing that! Sometimes, low level crafters aren't the best idea when you find you no longer want to play that race or gender. :P Yay for extra character slots I guess?

The burglar class in general is a blast as well. It already felt powerful at the lowest levels and it's only getting better. He's almost lvl 30 and hasn't died yet (*knocks on wood*). I'm taking my time leveling him and enjoying the journey! :)